Dan Le Batard banned from future MLB Hall of Fame voting

Sports journalist Dan Le Batard, who allowed Deadspin readers to decide his baseball Hall of Fame picks, won’t vote in future balloting and also was suspended one year by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America.

Dan Le Batard won’t be voting in future elections for baseball’s Hall of Fame — either on his own, or as proxy for Deadspin readers.

Le Batard was stripped for life of his Hall of Fame voting privileges Thursday, one day after it was revealed he filled out his ballot based on the results of a poll of Deadspin readers on who they felt belonged in Cooperstown.

In addition to banning Le Batard from future voting, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, whose most tenured members vote on the Hall of Fame, also suspended him from the organization for one year.

“It was worth it,” Le Batard said Thursday. “I knew this would be the consequence. Hopefully, change is a consequence, too.”

The BBWAA said in a statement: “The BBWAA regards Hall of Fame voting as the ultimate privilege, and any abuse of that privilege is unacceptable.”

The opinionated South Florida sports journalist received his membership through the Miami Herald but now works for ESPN. Only members of the BBWAA who have been with the organization for at least 10 years are allowed to vote.

“I feel like my vote has gotten pretty worthless in the avalanche of sanctimony that has swallowed it,” Le Batard wrote on Deadspin in explaining his reasoning.

Le Batard said he is bothered by “all the moralizing we do in sports in general,” especially as it pertains to the snubbing of baseball greats who were linked to steroids, such as Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens.

Le Batard’s ballot did not make or break any Hall candidate’s election bid.